We are not all body, nor mere animal creatures. We find we have a more noble nature than the inanimate or brutal part of the creation. We cannot only move and act freely, but we observe in ourselves a capacity of reflection, study, and forecast, and various mental operations, which irrational animals discover no symptoms of. Our fouls, therefore, must be of a more excellent nature than theirs; and from the power of thought with which they are endowed, they are proved to be immaterial substances, and consequently in their own nature capable of immortality. And that they are actually immortal, or will never die, the facred fcriptures do abundantly testify *. Let * As nature delights in the most easy transitions from one class of beings to another, and as the nexus utriufque generis is observable in several creatures of ambiguous nature, which seem to connect the lifeless and vegetable, the vegetable and animal, the animal and rational worlds together, (fee Nemefius de Nat. Hom. cap. 1. p. 6.), Why may not the fouls of brutes be confidered as the nexus between material and m material substances, or matter and spirit, or something betaveen both? The great diffimilitude of nature, in these two substances, I apprehend, can be no folid objection to this hypothefis, if we confider (befide our own ignorance of the nature of spirits) but how nearly they approach in other instances, and how closely they are united in man. Let us then hereupon seriously recollect ourselves in the following foliloquy. "O my foul, look back but a few years, " and thou waft nothing! And how didft " thou spring out of that nothing? Thou " couldst not make thyself; that is quite " impoffible. Most certain it is, that that " Almighty, self-existent, and eternal " power, which made the world, made "thee also, out of nothing, called thee " into being when thou wast not; gave " thee these reasoning and reflecting fa"culties, which thou art now employing " in searching out the end and happiness " of thy nature. It was he, O my foul, " that made thee intelligent and immor"tal. It was he that placed thee in this " body as in a prison; where thy capaci" ties are cramped, thy defires debased, " and thy liberty loft. It was he that "sent thee into this world, which by all "circumstances appears to be a state of "short difcipline and trial. And where"fore did he place thee here, when he "might have made thee a more free, " unconfined, and happy spirit? But "check that thought; it looks like a too "presumptuous curiofity. A more need"ful and important inquiry is, What did "he place thee here for? And what doth "he B 3 su " he expect from thee whilst thou art " here? What part hath he allotted me "to act on the stage of human life, " where he, angels, and men, are spec"tators of my behaviour? The part he " hath given me to act here is, doubtless, a very important one, because it is for eternity *. And what is it, but to live up to the dignity of my rational and " intellectual nature, and as becomes a " creature born for immortality? 66 " And tell me, O my foul, (for as I am "now about to cultivate a better acquaint"ance with thee, to whom I have been "too too long a stranger, I must try thee, and " put many a close question to thee), tell me, I fay, whilst thou confinest thy de" fires to sential gratifications, wherein "doft thou differ from the beasts that pe"rish? Captivated by bodily appetites, "doft thou not act beneath thyself? Doft " thou not put thyself upon a level with "the * It is faid, when the prince of the Latin poets was afked by his friend, why he studied so much accuracy in the plan of his poem, the propriety of his characters, and the purity of his diction, he replied, In sæternum pingo, I am writing for eternity. What more weighty confideration to justify and enforce the utmost vigilance and circumspection of life, than this; in æternum vivo, I am living for eternity? "the lower class of beings, which were " made to serve thee? Offer an indignity " to thyself, and despise the work of thy " Maker's hands? O remember thy hea"venly extract; remember thou art a fpi"rit. Check then the folicitations of the " flesh; and dare to do nothing that may " diminish thy native excellence, disho"nour thy high original, or degrade thy "noble nature*-But let me still urge it. "Confider (I fay), O my foul, that thou " art an immortal spirit. Thy body dies; " but thou, thou must live for ever, and "thine eternity must take its tincture from "the manner of thy behaviour, and the " habits thou contractest, during this thy "short copartnership with flesh and blood. "O! do nothing now, but what thou " mayest with pleasure look back upon a " million of ages hence. For know, O my foul, that thy self confciousness and "reflecting faculties will not leave thee " with " * Major sum, et ad majora natus, quam quod sim corporis mancipium: quod equidem non aliter afpicio quam vinculum libertati meæ circumdatum. Sen. Ep. 66. " I am too noble, and of too high a birth" (faith that excellent moralift), " to be a flave to my body, " which I look upon only as a chain thrown upon "the liberty of my foul." " with thy body; but will follow thee " after death, and be the instrument of " unspeakable pleasure or torment to thee " in that separate state of existence *." (2.) In order to a full acquaintance with ourselves, we must endeavour to know not only what we are, but what we fhall be. And O! what different creatures shall we foon be, from what we now are! Let us look forward then, and frequently glance our thoughts towards death; though they cannot penetrate the darkness of that paffage, or reach the state behind it. That lies vailed from the eyes of our mind; and the great God hath not thought fit to throw fo much light upon it, as to fatisfy the anxious and inquifitive defires the foul hath to know it. However, let us make the best use we can of that little light which scripture * As it is not the defign of this treatise to enter into a nice and philofophical difquifition concerning the nature of the human foul, but to awaken men's attention to the inward operations and affections of it (which is by far the most neceffary part of felf-knowledge); so they who would be more particularly informed concerning its nature and original, and the various opinions of the ancients about it, may confult Nemef. de Nat. Hom. cap. I. and a treatife called the Government of the Thoughts, chap. 1. and Chambers's Cyclopædia, under the word SOUL. |